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Frequently asked questions

What is the Green New Deal?

The Green New Deal is more than just one bill. It’s a vision for the future that stops the climate crisis, creates millions of good, union jobs, and ensures a livable future for all people. It’s the world we’ve always dreamed of, and the world we deserve. It’s rooted in the truth that every person has a right to clean air and water, protection from disaster, access to healthy food, and the promise of a comfortable life, no matter the color of their skin or where they were born. 

We will do this by transforming every aspect of American society and our economy to meet 100% clean and renewable energy in the next 10 years.

How Do I Join a Hub?

If you’re just getting started, a great way to learn about Sunrise would be to join one of our Welcome Calls online. We offer Welcome Calls to provide new members with an introduction to our movement and ways to get involved! Or, you can use our list of hubs (with contact info) to find a Sunrise group near you and contact them directly. Lastly, there are always ways to take action online if that better fits what you are looking for.

Who Should I contact at Sunrise?

If you have a general question or comment around Sunrise and our work, you can reach out to: [email protected].

If you’re a member of the press and need to reach our press team: [email protected].

What are the Hubs Doing?

Our hubs and chapters are working on the state and local level to popularize and win Green New Deal legislation across the country.

How do I get involved without joining a Hub?

There are always ways to take action online if that’s a better fit for you.

How are decisions made at Sunrise?

Right now, we’re building internal democratic systems to help our movement act with unity and make stronger decisions about the direction of Sunrise. What that means is we’re creating processes for our members to weigh in on key decisions pivotal to our movement. Democratic, transparent decision making helps all hubs and chapters feel unified and powerful.

Who started Sunrise?

Great question! The founders of Sunrise came from all across the youth climate movement — from international climate talks to the first fossil fuel divestment campaigns on college campuses to fights against fossil fuel infrastructure in our hometowns. Sunrise started because, despite some of the victories we achieved in those campaigns, it never added up to enough. The hurricanes got bigger, but our movement didn’t. We came together to plan out how we could make a movement that was as massive as the crisis we face.

Current leaders include these founders and more young people who want to stop climate change with Sunrise.

Why does Sunrise care so much about race and class?

For centuries, fossil fuel executives and the politicians they employ have used racism and classism to keep everyday people fighting over scraps while they profit. Building a movement across race and class is our only chance at building enough power to win a Green New Deal that leaves nobody behind.

Why isn’t the Inflation Reduction Act the Green New Deal?

The biggest difference between the Green New Deal and the Inflation Reduction Act is the kind of economy that they each envision. 

The Green New Deal envisions an economy with a robust public sector and low carbon jobs. That means public transit, public housing, workplace democracy, and investment in fields like nursing, care for the elderly and infirm, teaching, etc. There’s also a lot about community control of energy sources – such as community owned solar.

The Inflation Reduction Act is clearly an investment in the private sector’s ability to deal with climate change. The most striking example of this is the huge amount of tax credits given to electric car manufacturing.

donation and supporter FAQ

DONATION QUESTIONS?

What is the difference between “Sunrise Movement Education Fund” and “Sunrise Movement”?

The two organizations that support our movement are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit called Sunrise Movement Education Fund (SMEF) EIN: 46-4773036, a 501(c)(3) public charity that supports public education about the climate crisis and civic engagement, and a 501(c)(4) nonprofit advocacy group called Sunrise Movement EIN: 82-1232167, a political and advocacy organization. We work with our legal counsel at Trister, Ross, Schadler, and Gold PLLC to ensure compliance for all our work.

Gifts made to a 501(c)(3) nonprofit are tax-deductible, whereas 501(c)(4) gifts are not. We also operate a PAC to engage in electoral work called Sunrise PAC, and have both a Coordinated and Independent Expenditure (IE) arm. 

Sunrise Movement Education Fund supports our movement’s work to train our growing network of young people in the skills they need to take on the climate crisis in their communities and push for bold solutions at the scale necessary for a habitable future. In general, SMEF supports work like skills trainings, creative projects, and climate disaster response but are not used to support any work on elections.

Sunrise Movement aims to make climate change an urgent political priority across America, end the corrupting influence of fossil fuel executives on our politics, and push forward leaders who stand up for the health and wellbeing of all people. Our c4 supports our movement’s communications, political protests, and lobbying efforts.

Most grassroots donations go to support our organizing and advocacy work around the Green New Deal and the thousands of young people working across the country to realize this ambitious policy. Sunrise has hundreds of hubs across the country and a full time staff team supporting our members. Donations support our organizers and volunteers with materials, housing, technology, food, travel, training expenses, and more to make our work possible.

What is the core strategy?

Sunrise is building a movement of young people across race and class to stop the climate crisis and win a Green New Deal. The Green New Deal resolution envisions a whole of government approach to address the climate crisis, akin to FDR’s New Deal, that would put millions to work in good-paying, union jobs repairing the nation’s infrastructure, reducing air and water pollution, and fighting the intertwined economic, social, racial and climate crises crippling the country.

Now is the time to focus on a long-term strategy of building a durable public majority for the Green New Deal by delivering concrete wins for our communities to lock in job-creating decarbonization policies with justice and equity at their core. 

Our theory of change is key to our organizing. We build people power in order to win political power. Here’s how:

  • People power: training our multi-racial, cross-class movement of young people.
    • Base-building and leadership development: We train young volunteer leaders across the country in the art of campaigning, communications, and coalition building
    • Nonviolent disruption: We disrupt an unworkable status quo through peaceful, moral protest in order to highlight young people’s calls for change
    • Shifting the common sense: We target the public to build support for Green New Deal priorities across social divisions
  • Political power: re-aligning our society’s priorities beyond neoliberalism and strengthening the commitment of those in office so they will want to deliver on our issues.
    • Defending democracy: We use nonpartisan voter outreach strategies to make sure the ballot is accessible to young people
    • Expanding political possibility: We fight for a democratically accountable federal government that is responsive to the public’s needs 

Winning local victories to buoy national momentum: We fight for the Green New Deal on all fronts, from local fossil fuel fights to state policy to corporate campaigns.

What are the short-term priorities and long-term vision of Sunrise Movement?

Short-term priorities:  

  • Develop the next generation of climate leaders by equipping hundreds of youth organizers across the country with the skills they need to mobilize their communities around equitable solutions to the climate crisis. Sunrisers will be trained on how to build campaigns to address local issues, organize others around them, and pressure decision-makers to listen to them – not the fossil fuel industry.
  • Sunrise is prioritizing our vision of creating a truly multi-racial, cross-class base of organizers to build the people power and movement we need to win an equitable carbon-free future. We are expanding our focus beyond federal climate action towards securing more local Green New Deals across the country, investing heavily in the leadership development in our base of young people while launching innovative programs for Sunrise Chapters, Schools, and BIPOC Constituencies.
  • Current program offerings;
  • Green New Deal for Communities- This program will build strong local bases of members and leaders committed to fighting for climate change policy and the Green New Deal across the United States. Chapters working on local campaigns rooted in the needs of their specific communities are an opportunity to win local policy that is a showcase for what is needed at a national level, as well as an opportunity to bring the resources committed  to climate change in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act bill to the local level. 
  • Green New Deal for Schools-The Schools program will transform our school system to face the climate crisis and guarantee all students have the right to a safe and quality education-no matter their zip code or the color of their skin. Students will run campaigns to make their school buildings and buses run on renewable energy, include the science of climate change in their curriculum, create a pathway to green jobs and ensure all schools have a plan for when climate disasters strike.
  • Black and Latine Constituencies Fellowship-The Constituencies Program will diversify our base and enable our movement to live up to our commitment of multi-racial, cross, class organizing. The program is focused on building up powerful bases of skilled leaders of color in strategic locations for medium term and long term opportunities to win policy to address the climate crisis, starting in 2023 with Miami, FL.
  • We are making the Green New Deal a reality by focusing on strategic targets in the implementation of federal climate spending that build our power and weaken our opponents’. These campaigns will;
  • Promote concrete solutions to the climate crisis that are grounded in economic and racial justice
  • Undercut the power of the fossil fuel industry and stigmatize fossil fuel executives’ preferred climate solutions like natural gas and Carbon Capture and Storage
  • Build public constituencies for climate action for decades to come

Long-term vision: 

The passage of the Inflation Reduction Act in August 2022 was a culmination of the work Sunrise launched in 2017. This historic legislation secured the largest investment ever made by the U.S. to fight the climate crisis and will accelerate the production of American-made clean energy, address long-standing environmental injustice and set us on a path to cut climate pollution 40% by 2030. We know this act is an important milestone for our movement, but our work is far from finished. 
Over the next four years we will continue our work to bring the Green New Deal across the country, deeply organize our communities, and build the power we need to win the future and lives we deserve. Our movement’s progress will be measured in two main areas: 1)the network of volunteers, partnerships and elected officials we will have built to advance towards a more just, equitable, and sustainable society and economy; and 2) the local, state, and federal policies we will have passed to narrow economic inequality, address racial justice, and avert climate catastrophe which will materially improve people’s lives and the planet’s health.

What is your 2023 budget and funding gap

Our goal this year is to raise $12 million and we have confidence in $9 million, with a gap of $3 million.

How can I make my donation? How do I donate via check?

Please visit this link to make a donation to Sunrise Movement (c4) and visit this link to make a donation to Sunrise Movement Education Fund (c3).

For wire transfers and stock donations, please contact Victoria Garcia at [email protected] for wire transfer instructions and our stock brokerage details intended to support Sunrise Movement (c4) or Sunrise Movement Education Fund (c3).

C3:

  • Check Instructions:
    • Funds can be mailed to Sunrise’s DC location. Please be sure to add all reference information. 
    • Payable to: Sunrise Movement Education Fund
    • Please mail to: Sunrise Movement Education Fund 712 H St. NE Unit 626 Washington DC 20002

C4:

  • Check Instructions:
    • Funds can be mailed to Sunrise’s DC location. Please be sure to add all reference information. 
    • Payable to: Sunrise Movement
    • Please mail to: Sunrise Movement 712 H St. NE Unit 626 Washington DC 20002

 In order to support Sunrise Movement or Sunrise Movement Education Fund, we require a grant proposal.  Who should I contact?

If you need more information, please email Lexus Walker at  [email protected].

Why does Sunrise care so much about race and class?

For centuries, fossil fuel executives and the politicians they employ have used racism and classism to keep everyday people fighting over scraps while they profit. Building a movement across race and class is our only chance at building enough power to win a Green New Deal that leaves nobody behind.

I’d like to speak with someone directly before making my donation and I need additional information (i.e. 501c3 details, C4 options, etc.)?

If you need more information, please email Victoria Garcia at [email protected].

Want to Donate Shares of Stock to Sunrise?

Thank you for your interest in supporting Sunrise! We currently are able to accept gifts of stock through our bank. If you are interested in giving a donation of stock, please reach out to Victoria Garcia at [email protected] to assist you with processing your gift.